Pepper gives Tony a reality check
by Bl4ckHunter
Summary: One-shot story. Pepper has enough of Tony's shenanigans after Spider-Man Homecoming and gives him a huge reality check. Not for fans of Tony Stark.


**Something I had in my mind for a while. Takes place after Tony purposes to Pepper in**_**Spider-Man: Homecoming**._

**Disclaimer: I do not own anything in **_**Marvel Cinematic Universe**_**.**

* * *

After the forced purposing, Tony entered Stark Tower, only to see Pepper carrying a suitcase.

"Pepper, where are you going?"

"I need a break, Tony." Pepper sighed.

Tony sighed too. "Look, I know the purposing was sudden and I didn't think that Parker kid would do a mature thing in the…"

"It's funny that a sixteen-year old kid is more mature than you could ever be." Pepper snorted. "I think the reason how hard you are on him is because he is everything you could be but your ego won't allow you to do that."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Tony asked, offended and confused.

"Look, Tony, I love you and I always will but I can't do this anymore. These… shenanigans and radical decisions… I need a break. I mean… your decisions… don't you see how it's turning our lives around? You always let your emotions get the best of you?" Pepper listed. "Like seven years ago, when you publicly turned down and humiliated Justin Hammer, allowing him and Ivan Vanko to almost burn the city into the ground."

"Look, Hammer was an ass and I had to peg him down a bit and how was I supposed to know…"

"Look, I'm not blaming you for that, not completely but also, you were dying. And instead of letting me in, you instead shut me and Rhodey out and buried yourself in your shenanigans and work to cope with the fact that you might not make it until the next day, which led to pushing Rhodey away and stealing one of your suits in the process." Pepper reminded and Tony winced and sighed.

"Look, I know I should have let you in. It was a mistake but I was trying to protect you…"

"No. You were trying to protect yourself." Pepper corrected. "Because you think that you're all-knowing and that you don't need our help and that you can fix everything. It took Nick Fury, Coulson and Romanoff to help you find a cure for your condition in the end and help you make amends with all of us."

Tony winced, realizing Pepper was right. If it hadn't been for them, Tony would most likely have died because of palladium poisoning.

"Or how about what happened back in 1999 with Aldrich Killian? It's the same like with Hammer, you turned him down and humiliated him and thirteen years later, with a help of one of your flings, he creates an army of super-soldiers, walking ticking time bombs and he almost turned me into one too and he also burned your place to the ground because you publicly challenged Mandarin, thinking that the all-mighty Tony Stark could beat him." Pepper reminded. "If you hadn't been so self-centered, it all could have been prevented."

"Look, I was selfish and stupid and self-centered and I put you in danger, I get that. And believe me, I've been trying _not_ to make that mistake again since then." Tony said.

"Is that so?" Pepper laughed humorlessly. "And what about Ultron? Have you ever seen a sci-fi movie? I thought a geek and scientist like you would have known that plugging in an unknown alien technology to create an A.I. is a bad idea. And with help of Bruce, of all people. And what happened? You blew Sokovia into smithereens. And you almost created a second Ultron, when you plugged Jarvis into the perfect body that Ultron had created. It was luck that Vision didn't kill us all."

Tony felt like he was being crushed as Pepper reminded him of one of his greatest failures.

"And then, there are the Accords. Steve and Clint happened to reach out. Have you no shame? Selling Clint's family out to Ross, when your conversation in Raft was recorded? And while I partly get, why you wanted to give into the Accords, have you even put into consideration the negatives, as Steve had pointed out? The Tony Stark I know, would never have let himself become a government lapdog…"

"If we hadn't done this, they would have…"

"Done it to us, yeah, I heard that before. And because Steve, Clint, Sam, Wanda and Scott didn't sign, you were gonna have them all locked up into a supermax underwater black site with no due trial, no judge, just because they didn't sign a piece of paper and also, they were denied an attorney. Plus, you sold Clint's wife and kids out to Ross on open channel! The only reason they were safe was because no one knew about them and you gave Ross the perfect leverage! The Accords were nothing but a leash and the Tony Stark I knew would never have let himself become nothing but a governmental lapdog! I remember that you yourself gave basically a "Fuck you" to the White House on live TV, when you revealed yourself as Iron Man!

And part of me could get, why you wanted to kill Barnes but first of all, he was brainwashed and it was not his fault. And what would you have done in Steve's position, if it was Rhodey, who had been brainwashed to kill Steve's parents and you had found out before he did? And how much did Steve actually know about what happened to your parents? For all you know, he found out, just when he was on his way to Siberia!"

Tony was frozen as he let Pepper's words sink in, realizing she was right. He was someone he didn't even know anymore.

"And you know what irritates me the most? That you basically blackmailed a young kid, giving him little to no explanation, to travel with you to Germany to fight Steve and his friends, when they gave you valid reasons _not_ to fight each other." Pepper snapped. "And how you shifted the blame to him for letting Adrian Toomes steal all the tech you had confiscated, when you didn't tell him about FBI attempting to take him down and instead blaming him for what happened on the ferry. Yeah, Parker told me, he told me everything. Basically blackmailing and conscripting a teenager into your little feud with Steve, shame on you."

Tony looked down in shame, realizing Pepper was right.

"Look, I did what I thought was…"

"Tony, I swear to God, if the next word is going to be "_right_", I'm going to put on one of your suits and crush every bone in your body." Pepper said. "Until you start taking responsibility for your actions and realize how much you have shattered your relationships with Steve and everyone else… it's over between us. We'll be still engaged in public. But privately… until you come to your senses, we're done." She left into the elevator, leaving Tony alone to reflect on his own actions as the shame and guilt sank in.

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**Author's Note:**

_I used to like Tony, when I was younger but over the time, he seriously ticked me off with some of his actions and I needed to let this out. Honestly, I'm surprised Pepper has been as patient with Tony's shenanigans as she was in **MCU.**_

_This is copied and pasted from **Stand with Ward and Queen**'s opinion on Tony Stark._

_**Iron Man 2:** What made the first film so great was Tony's character arc of a weapons dealer and irresponsible CEO who realized he did more harm that good turning his company around and deciding to undo all the harm he had done. But the second film pretty much undoes all the character he has in the first film. Tony is just portrayed as an arrogant jackass all throughout the film. He's constantly bragging about his achievements and his decision to keep the Iron Man suit to himself, rather than being because he wants to keep it out of the wrong hands, just comes off as Tony having too big an ego to let them have it. Tony's arrogance even creates a villain, as the only reason Justin Hammer becomes an antagonist in the film is because Tony publicly humiliates him. We are repeatedly shown scenes where Hammer and Whiplash watch television and getting pissed off every time they see Tony on screen, so Tony's ego technically creates two villains. And Tony's downward spiral is poor writing. He alienates everyone around him because of his decision to keep his poor health to himself and I'm not even gonna touch on how he endangers people by fighting Rhodey in a house full of innocent bystanders._

_**Iron Man 3:** This is more Tony being a poor protagonist than an actual villain, but still, I have to cover this one. Following **Avengers**, where Tony was at his most heroic, there was no place for Tony's character to go but down. The moral of this movie is that Tony is a dick to everyone. The movie's villain only became a villain because Tony was dick to him years earlier. Tony is even a dick to Harley, who is the only person trying to help him at his lowest point. Tony's ego continues to put people in danger, as he gives a known terrorist his address, which nearly gets himself and Pepper killed. Tony is obviously suffering from PTSD, but because of his ego, he won't talk about it with Pepper or Rhodey or get help, even after this nearly causes one of his suits to nearly strangle Pepper._

_**Avengers - Age of Ultron:** And here we return to Tony being a villain. After being shown a vision of the Avengers defeat, Tony decides it would be a great idea to plug Ultron, a program he realized was flawed but didn't do anything about, into unknown alien tech without telling any of his teammates but Bruce Banner. Predictably, this goes horribly wrong. Because Ultron had Tony as a template, it decides the best way to save the Earth is to destroy the human race. You think Tony would learn his lesson from this, but no, he does the exact same thing with Vision, all but forcing Bruce to help him. Its a miracle that Vision didn't end up becoming a second Ultron. And let's not forget the only reason any of this happened was because of Tony's years of irresponsibility as CEO of Stark Industries._

_**Captain America - Civil War:** Tony, wracked with guilt over Ultron, is looking for absolution and decides The Accords will give him that. And his need for absolution makes him increasingly irrational over the course of the movie. He dismisses Steve's concerns about The Accords, makes Wanda a glorified prisoner at the compound, and tries to manipulate Steve into signing The Accords. He refuses to listen to Steve's warning about The Winter Soldiers, which leads to the fight at the airport and several of his teammates' incarceration on The Raft. Yet Tony does nothing to help them, even after he himself breaks The Accords twice. And let's not forget that Tony tries to murder an innocent man for something he had no control over. And we don't know how much Steve actually knew about the death of Tony's parents, he may have been in denialand didn't want to admit to himself it was brainwashed Bucky. Steve knew Hydra was involved but he didn't bother to look any further into that, which should give Steve a benefit of the doubt._

_**Spider-Man - Homecoming:** Once again, Tony causes the threat by putting Adrian Toomes out of work, all but forcing Toomes to turn to a life of crime to support his family, despite the fact that it would have been quiet easy for Tony to set up Toomes with a job. And Tony is just an overall terrible mentor to Peter. Basically kidnapping him in **Captain America: Civil War**, giving him faulty intel, then abandoning him after he's done with Peter. He doesn't tell Peter he called the FBI on Peter's intel, which causes Peter to mess up their operation. Then, Tony turns it around and makes it Peter's fault when Tony is the one who didn't keep Peter in the loop. And can we just talk about how messed up it is that Tony gave a teenager military grade weapons? Seriously, what was Tony thinking?_

_In conclusion, is Tony a hero or a villain? While his intentions may be good, tony ends up creating almost every threat he and his Avenger teammates go up against. He's a lot like Batman when you think about it. Like Batman, Tony creates his fair share of villains and threats._

_I don't care if you hate me but I had to do it._

_Please review and let me know if you have enjoyed this one-shot._

_With regards_

**_Bl4ckHunter_**


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